I am cute and my owners need the money

I think we all have to be honest about one thing, no matter how weird we find the fact that pets nowadays can become millionaires, or make their owners such, we all have liked at least one of those cute pics of Loki, Tuna, Grumpy Cat & Co.

I know this is totally normal. Every single person who knows a bit about click rates or like-numbers knows that cat & dog content is still among the biggest things on social media. Nevertheless, I think we all have to take a critical approach to the whole Instagram pet hype.

Of course, using your pet to make money isn’t as bad as using your kid to do so, but still, it’s a living being after all, right? Maybe some of you ask themselves what the harm in all of this is? The animal probably won’t know what is really happening anyway right? It also can’t be bullied in school for it later on, does it? But one side that is often forgotten about is, that this trend to turn pets into money via social media also goes along with the fact that a lot of people who aren’t necessarily big animal lovers decide to get themselves a pet now for no other reason than money. From what I experienced, those people usually don’t care much about the well-being of animals or species-appropriate husbandry. We can’t really ask the animal if it enjoys endless photo-shootings as much as its owner does and their owners often don’t see, or don’t want to see, the signals that their pets are giving once they don’t feel comfortable anymore. Therefor the only question that I am really concerned about when it comes to Animal Instagram stars is: Is it good for the animal? In case NOT, animal protection has to step in. I really hope that the owners of Loki, Tuna, Grumpy Cat & Co are animal lovers who take care of their pets as they should be and regard the health and well-being of their little insta-famous animals first priority and don’t just take them for living cash machines.